Apple is working with the four largest record distributors to create a format that will force people buy albums, rather than singles. (see also here)

The theory is that people will shell out $20 for

People don’t buy albums because they don’t want to buy albums.

In most cases, they never wanted to buy albums, they bought “b-sides” on old 45’s because you had to put something on the other side of the vinyl, and they bought albums because they were offered no other choice, particularly with CD’s where CD “singles” were about 25¢ cheaper than the complete album.

As Greg Sandoval (2^nd link) notes:

Perhaps Apple and the labels can come up with content combos that people will find valuable. But the danger here is in trying to force the packages on consumers and possibly alienating them even more, which could send them sailing into new piracy waters.

I will make two points about album sales:

1. The record companies put out crap, and frequently put forward no-talent photogenic “artists” who can’t even manage one good song per album.
2. Most of the so-called drop in album sales over the past few years that has the record companies asking for the death penalty for Bit Torrent users is actually more efficient sales…Fewer albums are shipped, because they better model sales, and get fewer returns.
3. The record companies put out crap, and frequently put forward no-talent photogenic “artists” who can’t even manage one good song per album. (Yes I know, but item 1 bears repeating)

There are a lot of people who have lost a lot of money betting against Steve Jobs, but I don’t see how this is a win….iTunes downloads are about 99¢, so a full album comes to about $12.00, and the record distributors want to bundle up those 12 songs with some liner notes, and go back to charging $19.99 for it.

Not gonna happen.